This invention relates in general to beds, such as hospital and nursing home beds, and more particularly to side guards for such beds.
The typical hospital bed is provided along each of its sides with a side guard which moves between upper and lower positions. When in the upper position, the side guard projects above the upper surface of the mattress and prevents the occupant of the bed from rolling or otherwise falling out of the bed. Thus, a sedated or feeble patient may be left unattended with some assurance that the raised side guards will keep that person in the bed. On the other hand, when the side guard is in its lower position, it is below the upper surface of the mattress, and this enables the occupant to get into or out of the bed with relative ease. It also does not interfere with those who attend to the patient. Indeed, the side guard should drop slightly below the pan surface on which the mattress rests, for then it will not interfere with bed making chores.
Parallel links or arms constitute one arrangement for supporting a side guard so that it will move easily between the two positions. In this arrangement two parallel arms extend between the side guard and the movable back section on which the head end of the mattress rests, those links being of equal length and rotatably connected to both the side guard and at the back section. Thus, the side guard moves upwardly or downwardly when the links rotate, yet remains at the same angle with respect to the back section. In order to enable the side guard to rise high enough to be effective in its purpose, and still drop low enough so as not to interfere with the changing of sheets or the replacement of a mattress, the two parallel arms must be quite long. This, however, detracts from the stability of the side guard, making it somewhat wobbly in its upper position. It further causes the side guard to undergo a lengthy translational movement when passing between the two positions, and this requires considerable clearance at the end of the side guard.
Aside from the foregoing problems, the practice of installing bed controls and controls for other electrical devices on the side guards of a bed, while making those devices more convenient for a patient who is actually in the bed, has just the opposite effect for those who are standing or seated beside the bed. The common pendant control merely rests on a mattress and may be moved about and operated with about as much convenience to the bed-ridden patient as those beside the bed. However, this convenience is more than offset by the tendency of the control to fall off of the bed or for the wire leading to the control to become entangled in mechanisms of the bed. The more recent side guard controls do not have these problems, but nevertheless are not easily seen or manipulated from outside the bed. Thus, a patient sitting in a chair near the bed, or a visitor or attendant standing beside the bed, has difficulty operating the side guard controls.